---

Inside Iowa State
Jan. 24, 1997

Meshing humanities, science topic of forum

by Anne Dolan
The Faculty Forum and Dinner series resumes Monday, Feb. 3, with a discussion on uniting humanities and sciences in the classroom. The monthly series is organized by the Center for Teaching Excellence.

Provost and professor of chemistry John Kozak has been recruited to help begin the discussion.

Kozak said he plans to address the "two cultures" developed by Charles Snow in The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution by looking at three models for teaching science to non-science (or non-engineering) students. Those models include:

• Teaching a course that is structured like a majors course, though possibly with a restricted set of topics and objectives (considered a traditional approach to teaching).

• Teaching a course on the history of science -- a historically accurate picture of how the ideas in a specific discipline unfolded.

• Teaching a course on the philosophy of science, or encouraging students to see science as one of the "ways of knowing."

"There are different ways of understanding, or knowing, the physical universe," Kozak said. "For example, science gives one perspective; religion, legends or myths, another; and literature and the arts, another. Science, as philosophy, captures the idea that there is a relation between cause and effect that is verifiable."

Dinner reservations are due by 5 p.m. Friday, Jan. 31, to Jane Henning, 4-2906, e-mail: njhenni@iastate.edu. Social time is at 5:30 p.m.; dinner at 6 p.m. Discussion begins at approximately 6:45 p.m. Faculty unable to come for dinner are welcome to join the discussion.

Iowa State homepage

Inside Iowa State, inside@iastate.edu, University Relations
Copyright © 1997, Iowa State University, all rights reserved
URL: http://www.iastate.edu/general/Inside/1997/0124/forum.html
Revised 1/23/97